Hospital rises on its chief's guiding principles

One of Princeton Healthcare System CEO Barry Rabner's first orders of business was to develop the medical equivalent of a Bible. It contained what he called his guiding principles. "Reduce errors. Reduce falls. Reduce infections. Improve communications. Improve clinical outcomes. Reduce operating costs," said Rabner. "We posted those guiding principles in front of the room whenever our teams met. When an idea would be advanced, we'd ask which guiding principles would be impacted. In essence, each of those conversations was held in anticipation of today, when the $522.7 million University Medical Center of Princeton at Plainsboro was scheduled to open for business."